Finland’s Centre for Open Source Solutions (COSS) is about to start a study into the use of open source software solutions for unified communication and collaboration. The centre says that smaller municipalities have expressed a need for a comprehensive ‘cost-effective and IT vendor-neutral’ software solution.
COSS, an open source industry association, aims to assemble an integrated and coherent service offering. It expects that some of its members could offer support to Finnish municipalities interested in implementing and using such a solution. There are plenty of open source options, the organisation writes on its website. However, there is no complete, integrated solution.
The association hopes to make clear whether and how to combine open source components into a unified communication and collaboration suite. This should allow municipalities to securely store and share documents, and support online negotiation and voting.
Grant
The study is made possible by a EUR 4000 grant from the Finnish Unix User Group (FUUG), announced in early July.
The FUUG grant will enable COSS to start the preliminary study, the association says. The study will determine which open source tools can be combined into an integrated solution for unified communication and collaboration. Later, the centre hopes to also build and test an integrated unified communication and collaboration solution.
More information:
COSS announcement (in Finnish)
FUUG grant announcement (in Finnish)